Sweet and Sour
by musikofthenight
Summary: Elizabeth Bennet decides to move to the small island of Castanet to escape the unrealistic expectations of her overwhelming mother. She runs into the proud owner of the island, Chase Darcy. At first glance, she finds him to be a rude, spoiled brat; but could there be more to his mysterious character? (Rated T to be safe)


It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single woman in possession of an irritating mother must be in want of a new home. On none other day was this true than when Mrs. Bennet burst into the room and yelled to her husband, "Have you not heard? The house up on the hill has been sold at last!" Her husband, Mr. Bennet, chose not to dignify this exclamation with a response, merely turning the page of the morning newspaper. Mrs. Bennet took this as invitation enough to continue.

"It has been sold, to a young college student that makes over two million dollars a year!" Mrs. Bennet nearly swooned with her own excitement. It was then that Mr. Bennet looked up from his paper wearily.

"I hardly know what you want me to do about it," he sighed, standing and moving towards his own private sitting room.

"You can be so dull sometimes, my dear Mr. Bennet," Mrs. Bennet whined, following him like a dog follows his tail. "You must visit him, so that I may introduce my daughters to him!"

"Mrs. Bennet, this is the twenty-first century," Mr. Bennet sighed, stopping just outside the door to his room to face Mrs. Field. "Go yourself with the girls. Or, you could just send Elizabeth and Jane; they are the quickest of our daughters."

"You seem to forget, Mr. Bennet," Mrs. Bennet pouted with ever-growing annoyance. "That Jane is in London and Elizabeth has just moved to Castanet, or wherever your old inheritance is!"

"Good for them, then," Mr. Bennet muttered, closing the door and swiftly locking it behind him. "I rather envy them."

"Oh, Mr. Bennet!" Mrs. Bennet dry-sobbed, pounding on his closed door with unheeded pleas.

Elizabeth Bennet was having the time of her life. She had moved to the city of Harmonica Town on the island of Castanet a year ago, and she still enjoyed herself at a festival. They called it the Flower Festival, and the entire town danced and made a bunch of flowery jewelry, with the help of the town jewelry store owners, Julius and Myra. She noticed her friend Candace sitting down without a partner.

"Candace!" she gasped, panting with laughter and sitting down heavily beside her friend. "It's so merry tonight! Aren't you going to dance?"

"I'd rather not," Candace replied quietly, almost timidly, as she looked towards the jewelry booth. "There's no one here that I'd really like to dance with…"

"Liar!" Lizzie teased, scooting closer to the shy, blue-haired girl. "I see you sneaking peaks over at Julius. If you don't ask him to dance, then I shall ask him for you!"

"Oh, no!" Candace shook her head violently, thick blue braid smacking Lizzie in the face. "I'll just go ask him myself!" Candace walked somewhat quickly towards where Julius was sitting with some of the younger kids, sticking string through flowers. Lizzie sighed with contentment when she noticed Julius placing a flower crown on Candace and leading her to the area that had been cleared for dancing. The Witch Princess from Fugue Forest sat at one end of the dance area, waving a hand to keep the fiddle, cello, and flute playing, almost as if she was bored. Lizzie was craning her neck to see where Candace and Julius had walked off to when she was blocked by blue hair and a pair of warm amber eyes.

"Care to dance?" Lizzie's oldest friend in Castanet, Luke, flashed her a grin.

"As always, Luke," Lizzie laughed back and tossed her head, allowing Luke to lead her into a lively country jig. Their feet whirled, and Lizzie could hardly keep track of what she was saying, other than the occasional whoop of freedom that pried itself from her lips. But then, the music came to an abrupt stop.

"What's wrong?" Lizzie snickered, trying to maintain decorum as she turned around to find out what everyone was staring at with such horror. It was a boy, a man, and a woman. They turned disapproving eyes on everything and everyone, even when the crowd parted so that they could stand next to the Witch Princess and Mayor Hamilton, who had been following them nervously. The music started up again without a problem a moment later, but Luke led Lizzie out of the dancing so that they could sit side-by-side on a bench.

"Who are those people?" Lizzie asked, finally sober and curious. "Everyone seemed scared of them."

"They own this entire island," Luke grinned, but the smile didn't reach his eyes. "They employed Hamilton and they pay for certain items to be shipped here. You bought land from them."

"Well, they sure don't seem very excited to own it," Lizzie rolled her eyes as she studied the family. The father was looking around with a haughty expression on his faced and pride in his black eyes, and he seemed to sneer when he noticed Lizzie studying him. Lizzie then stared right back with a sneer of her own before he turned away again. The mother was looking at the decorations with the face of a woman that was highly disgusted, her violet eyes managing to catch the last rays of sunlight that reflected off of her blonde hair. She was chattering away at Julius, who kept getting paler and paler even though Candace held his hand. The boy looked like his mother and father combined: thoroughly bored with everyone and everything he saw. His violet eyes were cold, which bothered Lizzie with the contrast it had on his mussed strawberry-blonde hair.

"That's right," Luke sighed, finally allowing his smile to fade. "They've been trying to sell it off, Mr. and Mrs. Darcy, for years now."

"Who's the kid?" Lizzie asked, glancing at the boy to find him staring disgustedly at her. "He looks repulsive and repulsed at the same time." When Luke looked to up to see the boy studying them, he bristled.

"That's Chase Darcy," he replied, relaxing when the boy looked away. "We've been friends for years, but I didn't like the way he was looking at you."

"With absolute contempt?" Lizzie snorted, jostling Luke's shoulder. "Let's just get back to dancing."

"Yeah," Luke grinned again, but couldn't help looking over his shoulder to study the rich young man. Luke and Lizzie managed to forget Chase Darcy while they were laughing at Lizzie's clumsy steps, but soon enough Lizzie had to sit down to take a rest.

"How does he get all of that energy?" Lizzie wondered, panting, as she observed Luke dancing an incredibly light-footed number.

"He drinks lots of coffee in the morning," a baritone voice answered unexpectedly, causing Lizzie to squeak in surprise and jump off of her bench. It was Chase, who had been standing next to her, and he looked rather awkward at this response. He frowned as Lizzie began stuttering to form a response, then walked away.

"Candace!" Lizzie yelled when she spotted her friend walking towards her. "It's time for an investigation!"

"Whatever do you mean, dearest?" Candace looked at Lizzie in puzzlement. Lizzie merely grinned like a crocodile, leading Candace to assume the worst.

"You can't always be so standoffish, Chase," Luke was standing by his friend at the refreshments table. "These people have the best intentions."

"The best intentions for my money, I suppose," was Chase's calm reply.

"You and I both know that's not true," the good-natured note that was usually in Luke's voice had been replaced with scolding. "You haven't even met half of the people down here, and I know for a fact that you haven't met Lizzie yet."

"If you mean the stuttering tomboy that you were dancing with earlier—" Chase sniffed disparagingly, "—then I'm sorry to contradict you. She was too star struck to say anything of importance to me when I made a joke."

"If you're referring to the one-liner you always make about me and coffee—" Luke grumbled, rolling his eyes, "—then I can see why. It's a very lame joke."

"You're always saying that," Chase rolled his eyes in response. "She doesn't seem very interesting either way."

"Well, she's very pretty," Luke attempted, sipping a cup of punch daintily.

"Mediocre at best," Chase dismissed with a wave of his hand. "If she wore some makeup, she'd definitely look…_somewhat_ pretty. Why don't you just go ask her to dance again, if you're so eager to admit it?"

"Maybe I would—" Luke smirked knowingly, "—if I knew where to look." Chase simply snorted again and left with a turn of his heel that would've impressed the fiercest marching band director. Luke looked under the table. "You can come out now," he smiled at the two girls that blushed back.

"How'd you figure it out?" Lizzie panted, crawling out from under the table and standing, brushing herself off as quickly as she could. She pulled Candace to her feet and turned to face Luke with her hands on her hips and eyes ablaze.

"Seeing as some of the doughnuts kept going missing, I'm surprised that Chase himself didn't notice," Luke snorted, laughing as Lizzie blushed and wiped some mysterious chocolate sauce off of her top lip.

"Well, I hope never to encounter that unpleasant man again!" Lizzie announced to her friends, looking sideways to make sure that Chase wouldn't hear. "As if I would ever wear makeup to hide my true beauty." Lizzie was truly antagonized now.

"He wouldn't look half as good in makeup as you would, dearest," Candace reassured her friend. "Maybe that's why he recommended it?"

"Candace!" Lizzie laughed. "You always know what to say!"


End file.
